- Since English is not my mother tongue, there may be mistakes. I apologize for that in advance. If you ever notice any language mistakes, please do not hesitate to point them out to me.

- When you see "..." in a dialogue, it means that the character speaks a language other than English. In this chapter, it's French.

"Look at what we have ... Tell me my pretty, your parents have never told you to apologize when you jostled someone?"

Was someone talking? Who was it? Why was the world spinning?

"Hey, I'm talking bitch!

_ Hey dude, she's cute, we could have a little fun ...

_ Do you hear that princess? We're really going to enjoy ourselves. Just the three of us."

Her vision was as if misty, she felt a grip on her neck. Air... She needed air. That's when she decided to open her eyes. When did she close them?

To her horror, Hawk Moth showed up. This psychopath was grabbing her by the collar of her jacket. He had the most cynical smile she'd ever seen. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Chat Noir bending over to pick up a bag that was on the ground. At these sides she thought Mayura looked at her too, but she wasn't sure...her vision was still hazy.

Marinette's eyes widened when she recognized what her former partner had in his hands: it was the bag containing all the miraculous items.

No, no... no, no, no, no, no, no, NO, NO, NO, NO!

"Drop it..."

Her voice came out like a whisper. Chat Noir was staring at her strangely. She didn't hear what he said, all her attention was focused on the bag he was holding in his hands.

"Drop it..."

Her voice grew louder. But this Chat moron didn't listen to her.

"DROP IT !"

The cat was smiling. That idiot was laughing at her! To make matters worse, Hawk Moth grip grew stronger, forcing her to turn her attention back to him. Marinette decided it was time to wipe the smile off the ugly man's face. She gathered her last strength to give him a headbutt. Hawk Moth released her immediately. Taking advantage of his loss of balance she struck him a blow well placed. With that he wouldn't bother her anymore!

CLAK.

A metallic noise was heard. Turning quickly to the source of the noise, she noticed that it was the black cat stick that had just fallen to the ground. Why was it Hawk Moth who had the stick of this traitor? It didn't matter. She quickly grabbed it and threw herself at Chat Noir.

"Drop it! Drop it!"

The Franco-Chinese girl tried to touch him with her stick, but nothing could be done, the fool was agile. To top it all off, he sneered. Her body was heavy, her blows were clumsy. She was aching all over, and yet it was necessary to keep on attacking him again and again. The Miraculous had to be recovered at any cost!

Suddenly, Chat Noir took advantage of her moment of inattention to grab her arm. This was her chance! With a subtle flick of her wrist, she pulled him up to her. The cat became unbalanced and fell forward. Putting all her strength on her thighs, she jumped up to knee him in the face. She heard a creaking sound.

She never thought that breaking Chat Noir's nose could be so satisfying!

Her joy was short-lived. Chat Noir swore.

« YOU BITCH, YOU'LL PAY FOR THAT! »

For a moment, she was confused. Did Chat just speak English?

He threw himself on her, his green eyes gleamed with anger. Blood ran from his nose.

Serves you right, asshole!

He dropped the bag and tried to punch her. It was her turn to make him go crazy! She dodged all his blows without harm. Unfortunately, her vision became blurred. Her body was letting go of her. NO! This was no time to give up! Fight, damn it, fight! She felt her body tilt. That second of weakness was enough for her attacker to deal her a fatal blow.

She fell to the ground. Her body was terribly heavy.

No... no, no, no, no, no! It couldn't end like this!

As she tried to get up, the feline started kicking her. She tried to protect herself. Then two firecrackers went off. Chat Noir gone.

As her vision became darker and darker, Marinette saw Mayura. She had completely forgotten her! The woman was standing in front of her. Her fan was hiding her face. Then, as if the world was turning completely in slow motion, the bearer of the peacock's miraculous closed her fan.

It wasn't Mayura.

That thing had Mayura's body, but her head... This thing's face had no eyes. Its smile was much too pronounced. It was inhuman! The thing started laughing. A sinister, frightening laugh.

Suddenly the world began to turn, again and again... She felt herself falling into the void. She screamed, asking for help.

Nobody came.

During her fall, she saw all her classmates looking at her and laughing.

They laughed and laughed and laughed.

Tikki... Oh Tikki, if only you were here...

Marinette closed her eyes and cried. She wanted it all to stop!

-XxxX-

It was official, Jason Todd was not fit to be a babysitter.

For three days now, he had been forced to stay home to take care of a kid whose name he didn't even know. Why did he pick her up again? Oh, right. Yeah... Because she reminded him of the kid he was before he met Bruce. He started going around in circles in his living room.

"No... No... Please stop... I trusted you! Why? Why? No... Don't...don't leave me..."

His attention was drawn to the voice coming from his room. He heard her crying, screaming and begging to be left alone. For someone to leave her. He left his living room and went to the bedroom. On the bed, the girl was crying in her sleep. She was squirming all over the place, seemingly fighting an invisible enemy. He approached and sat down at the edge of the bed.

Her face was a little swollen, her body was bruised. When the vigilant brought her back the first night, he had to take her clothes off to treat her. She had to have stitches put in her right eyebrow, her stomach had been cut quite deeply and her left earlobe had suffered the same fate. When he had finished treating and disinfecting her wounds, the little girl looked like a mummy. At this point, she had a high fever. Seeing her frail body mummified in this way and her desperate cries for help, he could not help but draw some conclusions...

"No... No... No!"

Her voice brought him back to reality. Jason took the injured girl's hand and began to speak softly to her. This did not produce any results. Finally, determined to pull her out of the nightmare she was in -and because his patience had reached its limit-, he decided to change his method. The former Robin grabbed her by the shoulders and began to shake her.

"Hey, wake up! Wake up, Dammit!"

To the great contentment of the dark-haired man, the girl finally opened her eyes. Visibly lost, the little brunette fluttered her eyes a few times, then tried to stand up but was unable to do so, instead she let out a groan of pain.

"Thank God! I thought I was watching over a dead body. So? How are you feeling?"

As if by a miracle, the girl leapt up, not without letting out a scream -because otherwise it wouldn't be funny- and backed up to the wall, staring at him with exorbitant eyes. A long silence followed. The two staring at each other. Her with a terrified look, and him with a jaded look. Finally, it was her who broke the silence.

" I... Well... hmm... Who...you is? No uuuh... Oh, boy! Who... are you?"

Jason looked at her again for a moment, then decided to answer.

"You don't understand english don't ya?

— Speak... English?

— Yeah.

— No, I... I mean... hmm...no?

— You're lucky I can speak French kid.

— You speak French?!

— That's what I've just said.

— …"

The little brunette looked at him suspiciously while cowering a little more on herself.

Shit.

He didn't mean to be so fucking dry! That's why he preferred to hunt criminals; it was less of a headache. Okay, let's just calm down and fix this. He cleared his throat.

"So... what's your name?

— Marinette. How about you? Where am I?

— Call me Jason, and this is my home.

— All Right."

She was silent again. Her eyes wandered around the room with curiosity before she turned her attention to the second occupant of the room -which she identified as a bedroom-. Her gaze wandered between the bed and then Jason, and then the bed again. She was a little nervous. Her cheeks turned pinkish. Finally, she spoke again, fleeing the gaze of the person she was talking to.

"I... Well, I mean, did... did you patch me up?"

Understanding her embarrassment, he quickly explained to her that he had found her at the bottom of his building, deliberately omitting the murder of the two scumbags in the alley. He then told her that nobody in the neighborhood was a fan of the police, so he preferred to take her back to his place for treatment. Jason didn't hide from her that to do so, he had to take off her clothes. This information had the merit of making the girl scarlet.

His next move was to get up from the edge of the bed and go to a chest of a drawer, from which he removed a small bag containing several pieces of jewelry, which he then handed to her. When she saw the bag, her eyes filled with tears. Holding the bag in a feverish hand and carrying it to her chest, the girl cried silently.

The dark-haired man decided it was time to slip away.

-XxxX-

Week 1:

Their conversation was limited to the strict minimum. At the end of the second day, she insisted on changing her own bandages, not that he was complaining. They were both uncomfortable. Also, Marinette spent most of her time in the bedroom, only going out to clean herself. It was as if she was trying to make herself very small. At this point the vigilant was sure that if she could just disappear into the background she would. Not wanting to rush her, he gave her space.

He often heard her sobbing until late at night. When he would go out on patrol and come back in the early morning, he would hear her moving around the room, a sign that she had been up all night. However, she did not ask him about his movements. He was grateful to her for that.

At the end of the fourth day, she finally dared to ask him in a very small voice for something: clothes.

Yes indeed...

He had the feeling that he had forgotten something important lately...

He came back later with two bags full of women's clothes of all sizes and kinds - once out the dark-haired man realized that he hadn't thought to ask her for her size... -. At the sight of all these clothes, for the first time her eyes lit up. She thanked him warmly.

Week 2:

Jason was beginning to lose his patience. He felt like he had adopted a hamster. A small and fearful creature that he was feeding with burgers, pizza, french fries and soda - cooking was not his favorite activity at the moment-.

Okay, okay, he was a bad talker. She was trying to make an effort to communicate by asking him how his day was. It was the conversation of the century. Every time it was the same story. When she spoke, the girl was so red, he wondered if there wasn't a risk of instantaneous combustion. The girl was shy as hell!

He'd finally asked her a little bit more about her. She was evasive. He learned, however, that she was fourteen years old and that her favorite color was pink. She was also of Chinese origin but couldn't speak Mandarin. She would also be an only child. Ah yes, the brat was VERY clumsy too. Not a day went by without her bumping into something. She banged herself against open doors, drop things... At that point he wondered, how did natural selection miss this girl? It was a miracle to be alive with such a clumsiness.

He was frustrated by her silence.

Jason wasn't fooled, he knew his guest was hiding something. Those jewels she kept seemed to be very valuable to her. The little French girl always kept them with her, even when she was showering! He noticed that one piece of jewelry seemed to be her favorite: a silver ring that she had been wearing on her left hand for a while.

In view of her wounds and her screams, when she was delirious because of the fever that had hit her earlier, she was an abused child. And no doubt... She had also been assaulted one or more times by someone she trusted. That would explain her paranoia... -Jason had seen her startled several times by insignificant little noises such as a door closing too hard. Sometimes he'd even see her jump at the sight of her own shadow... She looked very regularly behind her and always managed to move around having him in her field of vision-.

This Marinette girl had escaped from hell. He was convinced. The big question was who was responsible for his hamster's distress... hmmm... his guest. Yeah, that's right, his guest.

He'd spent his week researching about her. He found nothing. No "Marinette" had been reported missing. In the government's database, no "Marinette" matched the description of the brunette. Nothing on the Gotham airport passenger lists. That said, it was not uncommon in Gotham for criminals to have children and not register them. He'd hung out in all the less traveled parts of the city, but still nothing. No one knew her.

That girl was a ghost.

Speaking of ghosts, it wasn't the only thing that bothered him.

Lately he felt like he was being watched. He had the strange feeling that he and the girl were not alone in the apartment. Sometimes a dark shadow seemed to pass through the room. Jason was sleep-deprived, it was the only explanation.

Week 3:

Lately, he's been wondering if the brat's not just crazy. She was talking to herself on a regular basis when there was no one in the room with her.

Another weird thing was that he was missing some pairs of socks. Well... maybe the mess in his house had something to do with it. But it was an organized mess! Usually he could always find his stuff.

Last but not least, Marinette had a black hole instead of a stomach. It had to be...because the astronomical amount of food that this kid had been eating lately was just inhuman. How could someone so stunted eat so much? Usually what he bought could last all week, but a simple race lasted only two days! She liked cheese a lot too apparently... It was the first thing to disappear from the fridge. A French habit, perhaps? He started buying more cheese.

His cell phone started vibrating, pulling him out of his daydream. It was a text message.

"Base found [Building photo]"

With the black hole story, he'd forgotten his job. He'd been tracking a group of traffickers for a few months now. They were selling young men previously kidnapped on the black market. The luckiest ones were used as whores, the others less fortunate ended up as guinea pigs for the psychopaths who came to stock up on "toys" for their sadistic games. The base being located near New York City... He was going to have to go away for a while.

His gaze turned to the bedroom door, which was locked. If this girl wanted to kill herself, she would have done it long ago. On the other hand, she might let herself starve to death for fear of leaving the apartment.

He glanced at his cell phone again. First and foremost, he was Red Hood. The brat was going to have to take care of herself. Not knowing yet what to do with the little brunette, he decided it was better to leave her a note than to go bothering her in the bedroom. He also left her a good amount of money in an envelope next to the note with her first name written on it.

He walked away. Not without one last look back...

-XxxX-

"How can you be so childish? Your sickly jealousy is really on a scary level, Marinette! Stop picking on Lila like that, it's really not worth it anymore!

— Alya is right dudette, I understand that you have a soft spot for Adrien... But this is going too far... Going so far as to threaten Lila is...

— Threatening Lila? Are you serious when you say that? Do you seriously think I'm-

— Mari, you've already stolen Adrien's phone to erase a message, you invited yourself to his house when there was a boys' party, you invited yourself to the Ladybug movie show just to give him a macaroon, you confessed to helping Chloe play a trick on Kagami... Damn it, Marinette, you even have his schedule copied in your room, not to mention the pictures... I'm sorry, but when it comes to Adrian, you are anything but reasonable...

— …"

This time, it was the first time that an argument broke out between Alya and Marinette about Lila. It heralded the beginning of a long descent into hell.

"Marinette, how could you push Lila down the stairs! It's so horrible... I didn't think you were capable of doing that..." – Mylene.

She got an hour's detention.

"Marinette... Is it true you refused to carry Lila's schoolbag when she asked you to? Why didn't you? You know she has arthritis, poor girl!"– Kim.

He refused to do her any favors after that.

"Marinette! How could you destroy the art class work?! Don't try to conveniently deny that only YOUR stuff is intact! Do you know how much time we spent on our artwork?! You are such a bitch!" – Alix.

This time she got two hours of detention for a week and was banned from the art classroom. Her parents grounded her for a whole month. They also became more distant.

"How could you say such a mean thing about us? I-I-I thought we were friends... You-you-I was wrong about you... When Lila said you threatened her, I didn't believe it, but...But...Now I know it's true. *snif*" – Rose.

She was banned from girls' meetings. It was decided that she would no longer be their friend until she publicly apologized for the horrors, she had said about everyone. It was only justice.

Then came the jokes. Oh... was her sketchbook stained with ink? A simple accident. Oh, she was getting a shower, because of a bucket filled with toilet water? Simple misfortune. Oh man, she tripped in the canteen because someone put his leg in the way? It was just that she was too clumsy. What do you mean everyone was laughing at her expense? It wasn't their fault that the scene was really funny!

Then came the hits. It started with jostling in the corridor, preferably near the stairs. There was the elbowing in the ribs too... and the tripping in the hallway. Not to forget, getting hit in the face with a bag! Thumbtacks on the chair, glue in her bag. OH RIGHT! Sticking her head in the toilet bowl. That was a lot of fun too...

Only two people were immune to Lila's lies: Luka and Kagami. They were trying by all means to cheer her up. But they weren't in the same junior high school. They wanted to convince her to tell her parents about it too. Nevertheless, how could she trust her own parents who had already punished her because of Lila's lies?

Then came that famous day, which made her understand that she was alone. That she had no one left in that hypocritical place.

"Marinette... I thought I told you no? Humiliating the bad guys didn't turn them into good guys... Stop trying to expose Lila and let it go, she'll get bored. Even Ladybug has learned her lesson and don't talk to Lila, follow her example!

— You're a coward...

— What?

— …"

That day, her love for Adrien Agreste died. As did her trust in humanity. Why go on being Ladybug? Because Tikki was her only source of comfort on a daily basis. Luka and Kagami were there, but not all the time.

She started to cry. When was this all going to end? How could people be so blind? So bad? Why was she defending those people? What was the meaning of her existence?

"It's not my fault, it's not me...I didn't do anything! I DIDN'T DO IT!

— MARINETTE!"

Marinette got up in a hurry. As she was at the edge of the bed, her body had to face the painful law of gravity and crashed to the ground with a thud.

Thank God! It was just a nightmare.

Again.

The figure of Plagg floated above her aching head. The latter looked at her worried. She smiled at him.

"It's all right, Plagg. It was just a nightmare, it'll pass."

Yes, since she was away from Paris, away from her classmates, away from her parents... Far from all this nightmare, everything was fine. Wiping away the tears that streamed from her eyes, she straightened up.